Mrs. Yorba, who did not like to have her plans made for her, decided to
give the party on the evening of Saturday week. The floor was to be
canvased, and three musicians were engaged. She promised the girls that
after this initial party they should dance informally at Fair Oaks as
often as they wished.
It was some time before Magdaléna rode alone with Trennahan again. The
other girls rode every morning and claimed him. Magdaléna joined these
parties as soon as her habit was finished, and met him every afternoon
at one or other of the new tennis courts, which consisted merely of
chalked lines and a net,--Ila had introduced tennis to Menlo,--but
either Ila or Caro possessed him with the tentacles of their kind. Mrs.
Yorba had made it understood that her party was to be the first of the
season, so the evenings alone were unoccupied. Trennahan dined twice at
Fair Oaks, but Don Roberto and Mr. Polk claimed him. Magdaléna wondered
if he had forgotten his original programme. But with four handsome girls
demanding his attentions, a literary friendship was doubtless a dream of
the future. She felt an unaccountable depression, and wondered if she
were going to be ill.
By the time the evening of the party arrived, the nervousness which had
assailed her when the subject was broached had been tempered by time and
constant association with many who would be present. Tiny and the other
girls had promised to make "things go." There were to be no ball gowns,
and the whole affair was to be as informal as possible. She even
harboured pleasurable anticipation. Parties, she had read and heard,
were brilliant exhilarating affairs, and she loved dancing as only a
Spanish woman can. In this, at least, she should excel her fellows. She
had taken lessons once a week for the last two years from a solemn and
automatic person who had rarely opened his lips except to complain of
the heavy carpets in the cavernous Yorba parlours.
Magdaléna dressed immediately after dinner; the guests were expected by
nine. She wore her white organdie, but fastened crimson roses in her
hair and belt. She was by no means satisfied with her appearance,--she
was too ardent an admirer of beauty for that,--but she knew that she
looked far better than she had on the night of her dinner. She shuddered
at the memory of that white ribbon about her swarthy throat.
She went downstairs, and thought the big rooms looked very inviting with
their white floors; the folding-doors had been rolled back, and the
parlour and dining-room made an immense sweep. The vases on the mantels
were full of flowers. In the distance she heard the tuning of a fiddle.
The night was hot, and all the windows were open. The dark grounds
beyond looked full of mystery, and of infinite depth. She thought at the
moment that there was nothing she loved more than the mystery of night
in the country. As she stood in the middle of the brilliantly lighted
room, the heavy darkness without outlined with trees and great shrubs,
the broken spaces above, set with stars, allured her. Almost
unconsciously she stepped through one of the windows, crossed the
verandah and drive, and entered the long narrow path between the lawns.
Here there was more sense of space, for the lawns were very large; but
the trees were close along their edge and massed heavily at the end of
the perspective. Above was a long banner of night sky. The monotonous
chanting of frogs was the only sound.
Certainly, California is a land of beauty and peace, she thought. Mr.
Trennahan says he has never known anything like it, and he has been
everywhere. Everybody should be happy in it, and I suppose everyone is,
mostly. Poets like Tennyson always make weather to suit moods and
circumstances. If they are right, one should laugh and be happy for
eight months in the year in California, and only sad when it rains.
There does not seem much chance for tragedy, although I have heard that
there are many murders and suicides; but perhaps that is because the
towns are new and excitable. There is nothing in the country itself to
make one unhappy, as there must be in other countries where Nature has
done so little, and they have so many centuries of tragic past behind
them.... Oh, dear, I am struggling toward something, as usual. What is
it?
She touched her fingers to her forehead, then drew them lightly back and
forth, as if to clear the mist from her brain, the rust from the
wheels.... I seem to have seeds in my mind. Why don't they sprout? Why
are they for ever knocking at the hard earth over their heads? One would
think they were in their graves instead of never having been born.
She sighed and shook her head, but her thoughts ran on. Am I happy? I
think so. And all the girls seem happy. Mr. Trennahan says he watched
the rest of the world rise into an inverted abyss of smoke when the
train slid down the Sierras, and that his memory has been asleep ever
since. I have been unhappy here! she continued abruptly. And one night I
suffered--suffered horribly--and this last week----She stopped short,
looking at the beauty and peace about her with a feeling of sharp and
swift resentment. She had a sense of being betrayed by the country of
which she was, far more than her mates, a part. She was of its first
blood, the daughter of its Arcadia, the last living representative of
all that it had been in the fulness of its power. And she knew
California and felt it as no one else did. That sense of betrayal, of
personal treachery, passed as swiftly as it had come, but seemed to
murmur back that it would come again, and again; and that with each
visit she would understand it better.
I have read somewhere that artists must suffer before they can
accomplish anything, she thought. Well, I should not mind, I should
not--at least, I think I should not.
Some time since she had come to the end of the path and turned to the
right and into a long lane running between fields. She sat down on a
stump; she had quite forgotten the party. Her brain was full of
struggling ideas. But in a few moments she surrendered herself to the
spell of the night. There were no trees quite near her, nothing but
level fields thick with grain. Far to the left and curving a mile behind
her was the black outline of the woods. Far behind them were the
towering mountains with their forests of redwoods; those on the crest
sharp against the stars. California was a new country. It might have
been newer, so vast was its silence, so primeval its peace.
Oh, I am sure I am happy, thought Magdaléna, suddenly. Yes, I am sure.
But I wish I might never see anyone again. California is faultless; it
is civilisation that has spoilt her.
She was stumbling close upon great truths; but it was part of her
inheritance that she had no perception of what she was groping for, and
passed almost unheeding the little that came to her.
"Miss Yorba, are you cultivating a reputation for eccentricity?"
She sprang to her feet. Trennahan was approaching her. He was in evening
dress, without a hat. His expression was one of extreme amusement, and
Magdaléna felt the blood in her face.
"Have they come?" she asked in dismay.
"They are dancing, or were about to begin as your mother sent me to look
for you."
"I had forgotten--"
"I was sure you had. Miss Brannan insisted that you were hiding, but I
had no doubt that you had wandered off in a reverie." He laughed. "Happy
you!" he said. "Happy you!"
"You think I am an idiot."
"Indeed I do not. I feel sorry to think that in a year from now such a
thing will no longer be possible. But we must go back, or they will be
sending someone to look for us."
"Is papa angry?"
"I don't think he noticed. Miss Montgomery and Miss Brannan were using
all their blandishments to make him think the party as interesting as
themselves; and I am positive they were succeeding."
When they reached the house, the quadrille which had opened the party
was finishing. Don Roberto was making a sweeping bow to Tiny, whose face
wore an inscrutable expression. Magdaléna was about to step through the
window, but Trennahan guided her to the door, and they entered the room
without attracting attention. There were some forty people present. With
the exception of the Yorbas, everybody had house guests. Mrs. Yorba sat
in a corner with a small group of elderly ladies. Mr. Polk stood before
the fireplace in the parlour, his legs well apart, staring absently at
the young people, who looked gay and content.
"What am I to do?" asked Magdaléna, helplessly.
"Nothing, just now, as there are no wall-flowers. In a moment one of
these youths will ask you to dance, and of course you will consent. It
is my misfortune that I no longer dance. I think your fate approaches."
A young man with a rather bright face came toward her. His name was
Payne. She had met him at the Montgomerys.
"May I have the pleasure of the first waltz, Miss Yorba?" he asked. "I
am told that it will be a unique pleasure,--that you can talk science
and waltz in the same breath, as it were."
He did not speak in sarcasm, merely in facetiousness. He was a type of
the fresh young San Franciscan whose ways are not as all ways. Magdaléna
looked at him in sombre anger and made no reply. He saw that he had made
a mistake, and reddened, wondering why on earth she were in society at
all, if she could not be like other girls. Magdaléna did not appreciate
his natural indignation; but she saw that he was miserable, and
relented.
"I will waltz with you if you wish," she said.
Mr. Payne bowed stiffly and offered his arm. They walked the length of
the two rooms in utter silence; then the musicians played the opening
bars of a waltz. Magdaléna remembered that this would be her first waltz
with any man, barring the teacher who had solemnly piloted her up and
down the parlours in town. She had hoped much from her first dance; and
she was to have it with this silly overgrown boy. It was a minor
disappointment, but sharp while it lasted.
"Shall we begin?" he asked formally. He was sulky, and eager to have it
over. Two or three of his friends had flashed him glances of ironical
sympathy, and he was too young to bear ridicule with fortitude.
Ila was floating down the room with Alan Rush, a young South American,
as graceful of foot and bearing as herself. Magdaléna forgot her partner
and gazed at them with genuine delight. She had read of the poetry of
motion, and this illustration appealed to the passion for beauty which
was strong in her nature.
She turned to her partner. "Do they not dance beautifully?" she
exclaimed. That much-enduring youth replied that they did, and asked her
again if she were ready. She laid her hand on his shoulder and they
started. Magdaléna realised at once that her partner was an excellent
dancer, and that she was not. She felt that she was heavy, and marvelled
at the lightness of Ila and Rose. They seemed barely to touch the floor,
and were laughing and chatting as naturally as if they had no feet to
guide.
"Could you take a little longer step?" asked Mr. Payne, politely.
"I--I--beg pardon for suggesting it, but it's the fashion just now.
That's right--a little longer. Oh, I--I--am afraid that your feet are
too small. Shall we sit down a moment?"
They sat down in the recess, and Payne wiped his brow. "It is so warm,"
he muttered apologetically.
"Mr. Rush does not look warm," she said cruelly.
He repressed the obvious reply, but made no other. In a moment he asked
her if she cared to finish the waltz.
"No," she said. "I do not. You may go and finish it with someone else,
if you like."
He moved off with alacrity, and Magdaléna sat alone for some moments
feeling very miserable. What was the matter with her? Could she do
nothing well? And she should be a wall-flower for the rest of the
evening, of course. That wretched man would tell everybody how badly she
danced.
But she had forgotten that she was hostess. A moment after the waltz
ended, three young men came over to her and begged for the honour of her
hand. They were Rollins, the sharp-faced Fort, and Alan Rush. She gave
the dance to follow to Rush, and the others, having inscribed her name
on their cuffs, moved off. Rush sat down beside her. He had a frank kind
face, and the beauty of his figure and the grace of his carriage had
given him a reputation for good looks which had reached even Magdaléna's
ears. He was at that time the most popular young man in San Francisco
society. Magdaléna decided that she liked him better than anyone she had
met except Trennahan. His voice was rich and Southern, although he had
no Spanish blood in him.
"I watched you dance," said Magdaléna, abruptly. "I don't dance well
enough for you."
"Dancing is all a matter of habit," he said kindly. "This is my third
year. You have no idea how awkward I was when I began. I am sure you
will be the best dancer in society next winter--with all those Spanish
grandmothers."
"Do you think so?" She liked him almost as well as Trennahan for the
moment.
He did not, for he had noted that she was lacking in natural grace; but
he was chivalrous, and he saw that she was discouraged.
"There's the music," he said. "Suppose we go out in the hall by
ourselves, and I will give you a little lesson. No?"
Magdaléna was delighted, but she merely stood up in her unbending
dignity and said that she was glad to take advantage of his kindness.
He was a man who danced so well that he compelled some measure of
facility in his partner. Magdaléna felt inspired at once, and carefully
obeyed every instruction.
"We will have a great many other lessons, no?" he said as the music
finished. "By the time that famous coming-out party of yours comes off,
you will be in great form."
"Will you open it with me?"
"I shall be delighted, and to help you all I can." They were walking
down the hall, and he was bending over her with an air of devotion which
she thought very pleasant. His accomplished eyes appealed to the
instinct of coquetry, buried deep in the seriousness of her nature, and
she smiled upon him and found herself talking with some ease.
She danced with all the young men, but they bored her as much as she
felt that she bored them. All the girls danced with her father, and he
seemed amiable and pleased, especially when Tiny was smiling upon him.
Ila, despite her elegance and refinement, suggested the ladies of his
leisure, Rose had too sharp a tongue, and Caro had an exaggerated
innocence of manner and eye which experience had led him to distrust.
But Tiny, beautiful, cool, and remote, reminded him of the women of his
youth, when he was a man of enthusiasms, ideals, and dreams.
Mr. Polk spent the evening wandering about alone or staring from the
hearth-rug. One or two of the girls asked him to dance, but he refused
brusquely. It was the first dance he had attended since the one given by
Thomas Larkin to celebrate the Occupation of California by the United
States.
The party broke up a little after twelve, and all assured Magdaléna that
the party had been a success with such emphasis that she was convinced
that it had been; but when she was in bed and the light out, she cried
bitterly.